I know what you're thinking at this point though: "Why don't you just have self control?" My response to that is: I'm working on it. =____=
Now I'm sure that y'all who are taking the time to read this are wondering where the story is going. It all began on a summer day when my boyfriend and I were walking around Taipei. I'm easily distracted by noises, shiny things and flashing lights....and because of this I usually notice immediately when an arcade is nearby. Nestled within this particular arcade was a machine. A flashing, loud, behemoth of a machine that everyone and their mom was playing on. I had to figure out what this was. I mean it looked like this:
Who's ever seen anything that looked like that before?! In an arcade! I was only used to things like the DJ game, one of the Dance Dance Revolution incarnations, or the guitar/drum/oboe/musical instrument games. From the hordes of people surrounding the machine it was clear that this game was very popular, and that only piqued my interest even more. From standing behind people awkwardly I had gleaned several basic facts about this game: 1.) It was music based, 2.) With each beat you tapped one of the sixteen squares on the main interface, 3.) People are really intense about it, 4.) It was called Jubeat Knits. Now, knowing all of this I wanted to play.
So I dragged my boyfriend over awkwardly, and took one of the stations that wasn't occupied. I looked up at him, back at the machine and wiggled his hand a little. He gave me one of those pointed man looks and sighed. "Do you want some change?" A nod. "How much is it?" A shrug. At this point a sizable line of teenage boys had gathered behind us, and it was clear they were waiting for the machine. Immediately I was intimidated. They all had...cards. Why? One of them was frantically practicing patterns in the air, another was getting his Jubeats gloves out, and the other was just judging me and my awkward interactions with the Jubeats machine. I am awkward normally, but I get more awkward when people start watching me play a video game...and I get even more awkward when I happen to suck at that particular video game. My fight or flight reactions kicked in, and after 19 years of nervous, awkward social interaction I did the thing that came naturally to me in times of stress. I grabbed the boif's hand and fled.
My second flirtation with this machine would come later with KC and some other friends in a shady arcade in Ximending. I don't remember the details, but I somehow got to the machine and inserted the correct number of coins. The game had started. I was selecting music. I chose a song. During the waiting period for the song to start the machine started searching for other players, I had assumed it was searching locally within the arcade, but no. This machine had WIFI capability and was looking for people who were playing that same song all over greater Asia. WHAAAT. It had found me some opponents in Hong Kong and Tokyo for me to fight. I nearly wet myself. Why. I thought this was supposed to be a private thing!? I had performance anxiety. Then the song started. Lights started flashing. Seizure inducing lights. It looked like this (obviously I wasn't as good as this guy, but you get the idea):
I don't know what happened. 一片空白。All of a sudden the music stopped and I came back to my senses. I was shaking and sweaty. I felt like I had just talked to a cute boy. Then I realized that I had cleared the song. Not only that, but I also came in first. EEEEH. I played two more rounds and had reasonable success. I was already addicted to this game, and I thought I couldn't love it anymore...until I was introduced to their crazy ranking system. I was a lemon with a jubility level of .13, and due to my success I had gotten an achievement. That achievement materialized in the form of virtual yarn that I could use to knit virtual sweaters which would then translate into unlocking hidden songs. I KNOW! AMAZING, RIGHT!? At this point cards made sense, for 120$NT you can buy a Konami e-Amusement card to save your ranking, unlocked songs, progress, and use that card to interface with other games. Needless to say I bought one.
Since that day I have been a woman possessed. I've since graduated from a beginner lemon to an intermediate bumble bee. JUBEATS.
+love
Since that day I have been a woman possessed. I've since graduated from a beginner lemon to an intermediate bumble bee. JUBEATS.
+love
